Dual Group One winner Kinross is the star attraction in the Jenningsbet Nun Street Newcastle Open Now Chipchase Stakes.
The seven-year-old has been a fantastic servant to trainer Ralph Beckett and owner Marc Chan, winning 10 of his 28 career starts to date, including successive Group One wins in the Prix de la Foret and Qipco British Champions Sprint in 2022.
Last season, the gelded son of Kingman landed his second Lennox Stakes at Goodwood and successfully defended his crown in the City of York Stakes, before being touched off when bidding for back-to-back wins at both ParisLongchamp and at Ascot on Champions Day.
Having again been saved for a late-season campaign, Kinross was originally due to make his reappearance in the Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes at Royal Ascot last weekend, but he instead travels to Newcastle for what will be his first start on the all-weather since winning at Kempton four years ago.
“We just felt running over six furlongs on fast ground at Ascot would be too much for him at his age now and the extra week probably isn’t a bad thing,” said the owner’s racing manager, Jamie McCalmont. “Starting back on a synthetic surface looks a suitable thing to do and he should be competitive. Obviously he’ll improve from the run, but we’ll see.
“If he comes out of Newcastle well, there’s no reason why you wouldn’t run back two weeks later in the July Cup, but it just depends on how he comes out of the race. After that, there’s Goodwood for the Lennox Stakes and there’s the Prix Maurice de Gheest at Deauville around that time as well, so you’ve got both of those options.”
William Haggas has saddled the last two winners of this Group Three contest in Sense Of Duty and Tiber Flow and again has a leading contender in the form of Montassib.
A winner over the course and distance on his racecourse debut in 2020, the six-year-old won the Cammidge Trophy at Doncaster on his first start of the current campaign and was last seen finishing a creditable sixth in the Duke of York Stakes.
Karl Burke is looking forward to firing a twin assault, with last year’s runner-up Spycatcher joined by stablemate Cold Case, who has been off the track since finishing fourth in the Prix Maurice de Gheest at Deauville last August.
“Cold Case is coming back off an injury from last year and he will definitely improve for the run fitness-wise, but he’s working nicely and we’re very happy with him,” said the Spigot Lodge handler. “Spycatcher looks in great form and is stripping very fit and has always run well at Newcastle. I think the ground was just against him in the Duke of York last time (finished 11th) and we’ve put a line through that. He’s bounced out of the race really well.
“They’re two very good horses and if they were both fully fit, they’d be very difficult to split, probably fitness will just favour Spycatcher I would have thought, but I’d say it was a hard enough decision for Clifford Lee.”
Hughie Morrison is keen to confine the events of last year’s Cairn Community Games Pretty Polly Stakes to the history books as Stay Alert prepares for a second tilt at the Curragh Group One on Saturday.
The Fastnet Rock filly was a 25/1 shot 12 months ago off the back of finishing fifth in York’s Middleton Stakes, but outran her odds and then some to finish second.
Stay Alert was beaten two lengths by George Boughey’s Via Sistina, but that told only half the story, with the winner hanging right and impeding the runner-up and a number of other horses to such an extent that connections felt it was worth lodging an appeal, which was ultimately unsuccessful.
Morrison’s charge failed to trouble the judge in three further outings in 2023, but having kicked off the new campaign with an impressive victory in Newmarket’s Dahlia Stakes, beating subsequent Royal Ascot heroine Running Lion, she heads back across the Irish Sea as a major player.
When asked whether he felt he had a score to settle in the Pretty Polly, Morrison said: “I don’t think one ever wants to do that in sport or think that way. Time heals and we move on.
“She’s done herself well and has done very well since she ran. My concern always is whether I’ve done enough with her, but travel can refine them down a bit and we’re just hopeful that she’ll run her race, perform to the levels she did at Newmarket and we’ll see how good she is.”
Stay Alert is part of a formidable British challenge which also includes Ralph Beckett’s runaway Middleton Stakes winner Bluestocking and John and Thady Gosden’s dual Group One winner Emily Upjohn.
Morrison added: “I think both times she’s gone over to Ireland, I feel I may have left a gallop short. It’s been quite dry in the last two weeks, so I haven’t overworked her.If Emily Upjohn turns up as she was as a three-year-old or when winning the Coronation Cup last year we’ll have to be very good to beat her, and Bluestocking on the formbook looks exceptional as well. Stay Alert doesn’t always retain her form throughout the season, but she seems happy in herself and Running Lion’s victory last week gave us a bit of hope.”
Emily Upjohn has run twice so far this year, finishing fifth in the Dubai Sheema Classic at Meydan in March before being beaten into fourth when defending her Coronation Cup crown at Epsom.
John Gosden believes she is ready to return to her best in Ireland, saying: “I think in fairness to her, we trained her in the winter to go to Dubai and it doesn’t agree with a lot of fillies, so then I let her down afterwards through April and she really did herself well .I was having a little trouble getting her back in the zone again and she very much needed her race in the Coronation. She was carrying plenty of weight and condition, but she worked well on the July Course the other day so we’ll head there (Curragh) for what looks like a very competitive edition of the Pretty Polly.”
Bluestocking could hardly have been more impressive at York last month and Beckett is looking forward to seeing her return to the highest level.
He said: “It’s all systems go all, all things being equal. She’s in good shape, I’ve been very pleased with her since York. We were keen to stick with running against our own sex and this is what the race was written for, these fillies turning up to take each other on and we’re looking forward to doing exactly that.
“It appears she’s not (ground dependent) anymore, as she’s got older it appears not. There are plenty of fast ground elements in her pedigree and she’s a good moving filly.”
